Connected - Choose your BFF's wisley
Have you realised the influence that our associations have on us?? Experiments in the last couple of decades have shown that we can literally catch emotions from others. When first year university students were randomly assigned to live with mildly depressed room mates, they became increasingly depressed over a period of 3 months. There has also been plenty of literature on waiters that provide service with a smile receiving more tips.
It is an inevitable fact of being human that we are hardwired to be influenced strongly by those closest to us. We even have specialty areas of the brain with "mirror neurons" that allow us to feel and experience what others are going through as if it were us. That is why we tend to mimic peoples facial expressions, postures and vocalisations ........as a consequence we meld with each others emotional states. And thats why contagion of emotions can spread very rapidly.
In the intriguing book Connected ( by Nicholas Christakis M.D, PhD and James Fowler PhD) they have been able to quantify Human Network dynamics to show that each happy friend we have can increase our chances of being happy by 9%. Each unhappy friend we attract will increase our chances of unhappiness by 7%. The spread of happiness radiates out to 3 degrees of separation, so our friends friends and their friends friends friends exert an influence. And that goes for anything, not just happiness.
This may not sound like a lot but the effect is cumulative. If you compare it to an increase of Ten thousand dollars pay increase (assuming you are on or above the average salary), This will only result in a 2% increase in happiness.
For example, if a mutual friend becomes obese, it will nearly triple a persons chance of becoming obese. Interestingly mutual friends are nearly twice as influential as friends people name who do not get named back.
So it really pays to Choose your BFF (Best Friend Forever) wisely. In fact it is a good practice to review the 5 closest people to you. Are they supportive, are they happy, do they have good habits that you would aspire to?????
The storm in any relationship tends to revolve around one or both individuals trying to change the other, not accepting them for who they are. It is part of the Human condition to have this illusion that our way of seeing the world……….